21–30 of 44 posts
I've had the privilege of working with the patient described in the podcast. She's unique in any sense of the word.
This reminds me of discussions of pain asymbolia or not being able to feel pain (diabetes, leprosy): it's a crippling and dangerous problem. Fear, pain, guilty - the gifts no one appreciates.
This reminds me of discussions of pain asymbolia or not being able to feel pain (diabetes, leprosy): it's a crippling and dangerous problem. Fear, pain, guilty - the gifts no one appreciates.
Well, she literally hasn't. So is she an Olympic champion who fights crime during the night and writes amazing novels during the day and commutes to work swimming together with a school of piranhas, or has she led a relatively normal life? She can follow her passion with no fear of failure or success or whatever!
I'm genuinely curious to find scientific evidence about whether fear is the only thing holding us back or there are other factors.
I wonder whether she has done truly awesome things with her life. One of these pieces of advice you hear often regarding your true vocation goes something like _what would you do if you had no fear?_. Well, she literally hasn't. So is she an Olympic champion who fights crime during the night and writes amazing novels during the day and commutes to work swimming together with a school of piranhas, or has she led a rel…
This reminds me of discussions of pain asymbolia or not being able to feel pain (diabetes, leprosy): it's a crippling and dangerous problem. Fear, pain, guilty - the gifts no one appreciates.
By lumping them all together, you are implying that fear is a gift. The NPR podcast on the other hand suggests otherwise. SM describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times, and she has no past trauma. Sounds like being fearless is in fact the under-appreciated gift.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
By lumping them all together, you are implying that fear is a gift. The NPR podcast on the other hand suggests otherwise. SM describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times, and she has no past trauma. Sounds like being fearless is in fact the under-appreciated gift.
I think you miss the point. She describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times because she is also unable to notice the real dangers that fear is there to help us handle. While it may be great to not feel afraid, as the article points out it also leads her to risky behaviour that most healthy persons would avoid.
This reminds me of discussions of pain asymbolia or not being able to feel pain (diabetes, leprosy): it's a crippling and dangerous problem. Fear, pain, guilty - the gifts no one appreciates.
Neuropathy (from diabetes or otherwise) is unusual in that it both causes pain constantly (when no stimuli is present) while simultaneous blocking real pain. It's the worst of both worlds. You don't notice when something is actually wrong while you are also constantly suffering.
Only some types of neuropathy are like that (and there are many kinds). In other cases there are no sensations at all.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
By lumping them all together, you are implying that fear is a gift. The NPR podcast on the other hand suggests otherwise. SM describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times, and she has no past trauma. Sounds like being fearless is in fact the under-appreciated gift.
I think you miss the point. She describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times because she is also unable to notice the real dangers that fear is there to help us handle. While it may be great to not feel afraid, as the article points out it also leads her to risky behaviour that most healthy persons would avoid.
I do get gwern's implication of fear being a gift. His applauding of fear was (presumably) in response to Rachel Feltman's (WashingtonPost's journalist) "a bad thing" appraisal of her lack of fear during those two incidents of being held at knifepoint and those two other incidents of being held at gunpoint. Whereas you completely miss the point I was trying to make. That, it matters not that in her entire lifetime she failed to feel afraid in those four instances (of being held at knifepoint or gunpoint) -- and we do not yet know if she actually handled them intelligently or not (i.e., had the time and energy to think through her responses instead of them being, say, flippantly knee-jerk) -- as they are nothing in the large scheme of an entire of life of being mostly happy. Say, she has lived for some 50 years with this condition, then she has been happy the whole 45 years. An ordinary "healthy person" would have been happy say 25 years with ordinary "healthy" incidents of fear, even trauma, peppered throughout their lifetime.
> She describes herself to be happy 9 out of 10 times because she is also unable to notice the real dangers [...]
What 'real dangers' are they (other than the four incidences noted above)?
> [...] real dangers that fear is there to help us handle.
How exactly does fear help you handle 'real dangers'? It seems that SM had no trouble handling those four incidents (of being held at knifepoint or gunpoint) admirably. Most "healthy people" on the other hand would cringe/freeze and even develop "traumas", much less have the energy to think through their responses.
> While it may be great to not feel afraid, as the article points out it also leads her to risky behaviour that most healthy persons would avoid.
You are merely speculating trying to justify your fear of lack of fear, unless by 'risky behaviour' you only refer to those four incidents (of being held at knifepoint or gunpoint) which this women seems to have handled admirably.
Being fearless is indeed under appreciated, even at HN.
I wonder whether she has done truly awesome things with her life. One of these pieces of advice you hear often regarding your true vocation goes something like _what would you do if you had no fear?_. Well, she literally hasn't. So is she an Olympic champion who fights crime during the night and writes amazing novels during the day and commutes to work swimming together with a school of piranhas, or has she led a rel…
I think what they really mean by fear, in those advice, is actually "learned helplessness". You refrain from applying that great position you've always dreamed of, because you "fear" that being rejected would crush your dreams. This is a complex thought. What this woman lacks, as I understand, is something more elementary.